February 22, 2007 7:04 AM

Today's sign that the Apocalypse is upon us

With One Word, Children’s Book Sets Off Uproar

Single Word Causes Uproar in Children’s Book

It’s rare to hear the word “scrotum,” in polite conversation. Seeing it on the first page of a children’s book has some parents and teachers up in arms.On the first page of The Higher Power of Lucky by Susan Patron, this year’s recipient of the Newbery Medal, Lucky Trimble, a scrappy ten-year-old orphan, hears the word through a hole in the wall. This happens when another character s explaining that a rattlesnake bit his dog on the scrotum. Some school librarians, after hearing about the word being in The Higher Power of Lucky,” have vowed to ban the book from their libraries. This has reopened the debate over what is acceptable for children to read.

You know, I’m all for protecting our children from harmful influences, but I’ve been racking my brain trying to figure out how a part of the human anatomy could (or should) be held to be offensive. Honestly, I’m coming up empty, y’all. No matter how hard I try, I keep coming back to the reality that “scrotum” is a part of the human anatomy…and I’m tired of the attitude that we need to be ashamed of any part of the human body. The misguided Puritanical ethic does nothing but shield children from things they really should know about…particularly in this age of HIV/AIDS.

Really…what is so dirty, nasty, or offensive about “scrotum”? It’s not as if it was used in a sexual or suggestive manner. Far from it. So why, then, must the Puritans and the fraidy-cats and those born-again trolls “shield” our children from something that is in no shape, manner, or form offensive…except to themselves?

Never did I EVER think that I would be writing ANYTHING in defense of the word “scrotum”. That I even feel the need to is a sad commentary on the state of our society. Have we become so intolerant, so judgemental, so reactionary, and so ashamed our own bodies that we must teach our children these “values”? Why can we not teach our children to be proud of, to respect, and to understand their bodies? Or do we want our children to grow up hating themselves as they deal with eating disorders or various other self-destructive, self-hating behaviors?

Yes, that’s a rhetorical question. Too many of y’all have already provided the answer.

“This book included what I call a Howard Stern-type shock treatment just to see how far they could push the envelope, but they didn’t have the children in mind,” Dana Nilsson, a teacher and librarian in Durango, Colo., wrote on LM_Net, a mailing list that reaches more than 16,000 school librarians. “How very sad.”

What “shock treatment”? The author, Susan Patron, has said that this was merely an attempt to teach children about body parts. What could possibly be offensive about that? There is nothing shocking about using the word “scrotum”. After all, a scrotum is part of the male anatomy, like an arm, or a leg, or a head, or a brain- which most of those claiming offense seem to be reluctant to use.

The book has already been banned from school libraries in a handful of states in the South, the West and the Northeast, and librarians in other schools have indicated in the online debate that they may well follow suit. Indeed, the topic has dominated the discussion among librarians since the book was shipped to schools.

File this one under “overreaction” or “censorship”…because that’s exactly what we’re talking about here. It’s not as if Patron had here characters doing the “nasty” as the setting for using the word “scrotum”. There are WAY too many people out there taking themselves and their narrow, ignorant world view WAY too seriously.

Pat Scales, a former chairwoman of the Newbery Award committee, said that declining to stock the book in libraries was nothing short of censorship.

Finally a voice of reason. Children need to learn about their bodies, and they need to be able to do so in a manner in which they’re not indoctrinated with the idea that certain body parts are “dirty” or “nasty”. Why must children be taught that their bodies are something to be ashamed of? Perhaps if we did a better job of teaching our children to be proud of and to understand and respect their bodies, we’d have fewer problems with things like eating disorders.

You know, if y’all are looking for something to become outraged over, there are no lack of available options. Y’all elected a pair of liars and thugs to run this country. They’re murdering our sons and daughters in Iraq. We’re spending our children’s future on a pointless, immoral war of occupation. AND YOU’RE WORRIED ABOUT SOMEONE HAVING THE TEMERITY TO USE THE WORD “SCROTUM” IN A CHILDREN’S BOOK??

How about you just get over yourselves already??

WE DESERVE BETTER.

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This page contains a single entry by Jack Cluth published on February 22, 2007 7:04 AM.

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Today's sign that the Apocalypse is upon us (Or, let me be the first to sound the death knell for the "Religion of Peace") is the next entry in this blog.

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